At Least He's Not On Fire: A Tour of the Things That Escape My Head (8 page)

As he finished announcing the death of another friend, the sound of breaking stone broke the stale, hot afternoon silence. The two men turned from their places on the slope of the depression and looked at the tall structure. It wobbled, faltering slightly, as if the root of the building had been shaken.

Intelligence analysts later came to the conclusion that the ancient structure had been weakened by the claws and spittle of the demon, and the repeated grenade explosions. Anton didn’t think that was all correct. It was too scientific. He thought it was the worm.

As fast as the strike of a viper, an enormous mouth blasted up through the dense jungle earth at the base of the temple, swallowing the structure whole and sprouting into the air like a plateau being born. The armor-encrusted worm creature was enormous, gargantuan and alien by any measure, and it was able to writhe straight up into the heights of the trees as the lump of the temple slid down its gullet. The two soldiers ran. There was no fighting a creature that large with the weapons they had. It would need airstrikes, and maybe a priest. Definitely a priest.

The worm swayed its building-thick body back and forth like a swollen tendril of evil, smashing down the trees around the temple, flattening anything that it came into contact with. It wriggled and ruptured the earth, causing destruction on a bomb like scale. Anton had run with all the might his heat depleted body could muster, and he was still almost crushed by falling and flung trees. His Captain narrowly escaped as well, both men cut and punctured by shards of wood. The two men converged hundreds of meters later as the worm retreated down into the gaping hole it had created under the temple. The ground shuddered.

"What the fuck was that?" Anton had asked, hands on knees, bile in his throat.

"One of those worm things from the temple carvings. Sweet Jesus. We need to get word to…" The Captain's voice trailed off, and he looked to the hole in the ground. It was easy to see the site of the former temple. The worm had cleared the entire hillside. Anton turned and watched as a black tide of winged monsters vomited forth, streaming into the sky like the a fecal burst of the most evil beast imaginable. Hundreds, then thousands, then more came out. A flowing nightmare spread out into the sky. The men ran again.

It took mere hours for the second hole to open up that day, that time in China. The Chinese weren't prepared, and thousands died by the hour. The third hole appeared in Africa, near the coast in Liberia. The entire nation was wiped off the Earth by sundown, leaving no more than bloody streaks on the ground behind. More holes appeared in South America, then Louisiana and Florida, then Spain and Russia. By week's end there were nearly three dozen of the holes. Hell Holes the media called them. The name stuck.

It took that much time and more for people to realize the greatest weapon against the creatures was fire. That was why the tracer rounds worked so well. White phosphorous burns awfully hot, and works immediately on the winged ones. They were easy, the fliers. They weren't smart, feral and bloodthirsty to a fault, and even though there had been tens of millions of them, they were fragile. Glass cannons. Small arms tracer fire or a flaming arrow proved to be enough to take them down. A few well timed thermite grenades could take out a worm, but you needed to get real close for that to work. Regular bombs were hit or miss literally. Sometimes you could drop napalm on the massive creatures, when they weren’t swimming through the cities, toppling buildings from underneath, killing men and women by the thousand. Nowhere was safe.

Against all odds the humans were winning. Surviving. Coming even against the things from below. Some of the holes had been plugged. Nukes dropped down them, and the tops sealed with mountains of blessed concrete. Turns out having a priest nearby wasn’t the worst idea. There was some hope returning. Just a little, but it was something.

Anton's Captain was gone. He'd met his end when a flock of the gargoyles attacked their refuge in the outskirts of Brisbane. Through a wall of gunfire in the sky the Captain had been carried up into the clouds and torn in half. His guts had fallen like a knot of bloody string.
 

Even still, his friends all dead, Anton kept in the fight. He sat in the back of a Blackhawk chopper as it circled a run down neighborhood of Sydney. Beautiful Sydney, ruined by the demons. One of the giant worms was below, a small one by all accounts, only a hundred feet or so long, slithering its massive girth down a neighborhood street, smashing down house after house, trying to find the soft, juicy human morsels inside.
 

Anton had a team of men with him, and the plan was the same as it always was; to put down near the worm, and kill it before it ran the entire neighborhood into the ground. Some of his men were experienced, with grim faces set to the task they might not return from. Others not as much, their faces shaking, their hands trembling, words of regret held in their mouths behind shut teeth. It didn't matter now. All they needed was the will to fight against the forces of Hell.

And fire. They needed lots and lots of fire.

Tesser: A Dragon Among Us

A Reemergence Novel

Quite the mouthful that title is, eh? But it deserves it, I feel. Tesser was the third major literary undertaking I embarked on. It's a departure from the darkness that's occupied so much of the two projects that predate it, and it is a big step in a new direction for me.

It was a good idea. It IS a good idea.

It was a pleasure to write, and I really feel like it's the best thing I've written. As I write this Tesser is about to be released into the world, so we'll see if this hope turns into sales reality. I'd like to believe it'll catch fire, and sell madly well (or at least as well as AUD does) so I can keep doing this whole 'career as a writer' thing.

But we'll see. Hopefully this taste of his world will entice you to pick up the entire book and discover just what is happening in the world Tesser now calls home.

The book's idea came from my time growing up, similarly to the AUD storyline. One of my besties, Alan MacRaffen, was a fellow dungeon master, and he ran a game for me where I was able to play a dragon that woke up in modern day New York City. We were only able to play a few times, and the campaign was lost to growing up. This book was my opportunity to write the ending to the story he and I started together. Alan if you read this, I hope I did you proud. I know some (read: most) of the details of our campaign have been changed to suit my plan, but I hope you find this story entertaining.

Tesser is the story of an ancient and benevolent dragon that wakes up deep beneath Boston. He's been asleep for millennia, and has no recollection as to why when he opens his eyes. Very quickly he uses his magic to shift forms to observe on humanity, and what he sees disturbs and angers him. Technology is everywhere, magic is fading faster than the sun at sunset, and perhaps worst of all... he realizes that one of the other dragons is missing.

That wouldn't be that big of a deal, except…

Well, you should just read the story. Here's a taste of the beginning of Tesser: A Dragon Among Us.

Enjoy.

Prologue:

The Dream

I am flying.

I have done this before, many times, and it is joyous.

I feel the gusts buffet my body left and right, up and down. Though the wind is reckless, it isn’t violent. I feel the energy of the air lift me higher and higher, through the cool mist of a thick cloud that clings to my face and invigorates me. It is much like the first inhalation of the ocean's air after a long journey to the coast.

Far below me, I see green grass, lush treetops, and grey pebbles poking through the skin of the world. There is a single brown line of disturbed earth winding forward that I know to be a human road. I have flown over it many times before, and I have walked it as well. It is familiar to me, but I cannot quite place where it has come from or where it is leading.

It doesn't matter. I have eyes that see, ears that hear, and a nose that smells. In time, I will discover everything. When I flex my wings and dip below the clouds like a descending sparrow, I can see that miles ahead the road rises on a hillock and ends at a tall wooden gate. Fortified wooden walls spread in both directions. At the center, a majestic castle made of stone and timber sits in stark contrast with the surrounding hovels of mud.

I think it is my castle, but I don't live there. It is mine in the same way that a King owns a dog. Or a Queen owns a King.

My dream is almost over.
 
I feel it like a blue dawn rising on the edge of a long night. It has been a good dream for the most part, though in life, no matter how much the sun shines, storms always appear now and again. It is natural, unstoppable; it is the way of the world. It is the way of my kind.

I sense that I have been dreaming this dream a very long time. More than a night, or a week, or even a year. Centuries have passed, maybe a millennia since I last lay open eyes on the waking world. The castle I am soaring towards in my dream is certainly gone, buried underneath centuries of revolution and crumbled empires.

These thoughts do not cause me alarm. Nor do I fear what the world will be like when I open my eyes soon.
 

I am beyond mortal fears.

Those that wear two skins are but a nuisance to me.

My skin breaks the teeth of those that drink blood and stalk the night.

Were it not for the teachings and lineage of my kind, the magi would be ordinary, not the wielders of primordial might that they are.

Goblins, monsters, and fae are my kind and they pay me the respect that is my due.

I am the bringer of death from high above.

I am the giver and shaper of life in so many forms.

I am the bringer of light that illuminates all darkness.

I am the stone that cannot be broken and the blade that cannot dull.

I am the legend your grandfathers were told by their grandfathers.

My footsteps shake the ground like the war march of a hundred legions.

My heart beats as the thunder shakes the sky.
 

If this body does not suit me, I will change it and become whatever will thrive in the soil of the times in which I awake.

I am Tesser, and I am a Dragon.

And as I arc my wings once more to soar above the clouds, my mind elevates me away from my slumber; my fear finally makes itself known. A question, a single nagging lost memory, occurs to me.

Why did I allow myself to be pacified in sleep for so long?

Long slumbers are not my way.

Acquiescing is not my way.

I think I'll find out why I have slept so long now that this dream, this long, long dream, is over. And those that have seen to my sleep had best have had good reason for my time lost.

Because I am Tesser, and I am Dragon.

Chapter One

Abraham "Abe" Fellows